


day one

by johnyongclub



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Past Lives, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-25
Updated: 2020-04-25
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:40:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23837032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/johnyongclub/pseuds/johnyongclub
Summary: His love for Taeyong was an endless and bottomless pit, ever growing, never changing.
Relationships: Lee Taeyong/Suh Youngho | Johnny
Comments: 24
Kudos: 93





	day one

**Author's Note:**

> just a little something based on 25 Lives by Tongari. [this](https://open.spotify.com/track/3NcXzMpghTzgtwNZv2xWLe?si=1QFJuDLcS9-G0b10pENBPg) is the song i listened to while writing. there is only very brief mentions of implied suicide so don't read if that makes you uncomfortable! also as always this is not proofread. leave a comment and kudos! thank you.

_“The very first time I remember you, you are blonde and don’t love me back.”_

Johnny remembers the first time clearly. It was summer in the middle of 1623 and Taeyong had hair as bright as the sun and skin that glowed under its light. When he laughed, Johnny swore he could hear the bells chime, the birds chirp and the sun shone a little brighter, a little hotter.

It was summer and Johnny fell in love with Taeyong, who was not Taeyong then but a boy named Oli, whose mother came from a different country. Taeyong always looks the same; even when he had a different name, lived in a different part of the world and had different parents, different friends, different lives. His appearance was the only constant that he has. 

So Johnny remembers. He thinks he would remember Taeyong even if he had a different face and not the one embedded within Johnny's mind life after life after life. Johnny remembers because he lives again with the memories of his past lives. Sometimes it gets too much and he couldn't bear it, especially when Taeyong doesn't exist in the lifetime he had woken up in. 

Still, he would always remember the first time he fell in love with Taeyong. 

They were not friends even though they were the same age. Johnny was merely a visitor from another side of the city, come to buy silk from the most renowned merchant that was unfortunately too far from home. It had taken him days to get there, where he had met his cousin, who let him stay for a fortnight. Two days upon his arrival, Johnny saw Taeyong in the market. 

He knows this was an occurrence that had happened some hundred years ago, but the memory is crystal clear. 

Taeyong was gentle, small in stature, a boy with the feminine grace of a woman and it was heavily frowned upon back then but Johnny never minded it. It was questionable how it was possible for him to be immediately attracted to someone of the same gender, during a time when such relations were punishable by death. 

He knows now it was because their souls were always meant to meet, if not in this life then the next. The first time, however, Johnny never knew it was called love and that one always comes with a soulmate. To this day, he wonders if his mother, the first one, the real one, returns like he does.

Summer of 1623 was eventful. Johnny found out from the merchant and then his cousin after that Taeyong lives in the neighborhood. Johnny, at twenty-nine, an eligible bachelor at that time and had caught the eyes of many women, chose to approach Taeyong and court him.

He learned many things about Taeyong; how he loved red roses and flowers in general, how he always preferred sweet foods than savory. He learned everything about Taeyong and fell deeper in love with him, even though it had felt impossible to love him even more than he already did. That was Taeyong for Johnny.

His love for Taeyong was an endless and bottomless pit, ever growing, never changing.

He joined the army not so long after and fought the battle of stadtlohn. dejected, heartbroken, and willing to put his life to a cause. He thinks fighting and dying in the battle was worth it. It was worth it; he would have done everything else but live with a broken heart that first life.

Because in truth, the first time Johnny remembers him, Taeyong had light hair, light skin, a beautiful blinding smile, a laugh that tickled his skin and he didn't love Johnny back.

* * *

_“The next time you are brunette, and you do.”_

Taeyong had dark brown hair when they met again and he came as a surprise, wrapped up in silk, ready for Johnny to take. 

He remembers it as clearly as any other memory. Confused at first but then he had seen Taeyong at the brothel and he remembered Oli. He remembered Oli who didn't love him back, Oli, who was Taeyong, who broke his heart for the first time. Oli, who had loved another person.

Taeyong in the second life they met, was named Ruby, after a gemstone, because he wasn't born with a name and had grown up in the brothel, where he then worked. He was beautiful, as he was the last time and Johnny fell in love again.

Later he realized that he had always been in love with Taeyong, that he never fell out of it, even in death and the unknown space in between dying and being born again. He loves Taeyong continuously, unstopping, endlessly.

It was the first time Johnny had stepped into a brothel and it was only because his friend had paid a sum of money for him to. A birthday gift, he'd said. Johnny was thirty-five, alone and sad and still confused about the memories of a life that didn't seem like his present, but mostly, Johnny had missed Taeyong. 

When he had entered the room in the brothel, Johnny hadn't expected much. He had even expected to do nothing but talk, if the woman wanted to talk. He was not in the mood for anything else. He wanted it to be over.

What he found on the mattress, however, was Taeyong. His smile was knowing, like he recognized Johnny. He had worn nothing but silk sheets to cover his most intimate areas and a silver chain around his neck. He had curled a finger, called Johnny forward and Johnny did but he didn't take. He didn't take what Taeyong offered, didn't take what his friend paid for.

Instead he wondered aloud if it was okay that they talked. He had missed Taeyong so much it felt like there was a hole in his chest and when Taeyong had said alright, that they could talk, Johnny had offered him his coat but Taeyong refused. He wrapped himself in the silk sheets and sat cross-legged, laughed when Johnny told him a joke and in turn had some stories to share.

Johnny became a regular at the brothel but he didn't care about the word that got around, didn't care about his reputation. He asked for Taeyong every time and he would pay an impressive amount of coin just so his requests would be met.

Each time, though, Johnny got to know Taeyong a little more. He didn't touch him, didn't try to. They sat or laid on the same bed and talked about what they liked, what they hated, what they wanted. Taeyong wanted to be free, Johnny wanted Taeyong. He didn't tell him that. 

He collected more and more coins, if more meant they were closer to freeing Taeyong. He collected until it was enough and buying Taeyong off the brothel was the only way to set him free, so Johnny did. It wasn't an easy process but it worked. After, when he had safely escorted Taeyong home, he told the younger male that he was free to go, even though his heart was heavy.

Taeyong did go that night, with the money Johnny gave him to start anew. It was the most selfless thing Johnny had ever done, he thought.

But when morning came, Taeyong was at his door, carrying a basket of bread for Johnny to have. And then Taeyong came back every single day until Johnny sat him down one day and told him of his feelings. It was wholesome and it was good. Johnny was happy and so was Taeyong.

Taeyong had brown hair when he was Ruby and he was just as soft, just as gentle. He still had an intoxicating laugh and still smiled so bright it was blinding but he loved Johnny back this time.

* * *

_“After a while I give up trying to guess if the colour of your hair means anything because even if you don't exist, I am still in love with you.”_

Johnny thought his first heartbreak was when Taeyong didn't return his feelings but that pain was nothing compared to spending years and years searching for Taeyong and not finding him.

He had the means, the money, the way to travel the world in his search but in every continent there was no Taeyong. There were no traces of him, nothing but an emptiness that consumed Johnny, overwhelming and suffocating.

The pattern he had noticed was that he started to remember when he reached the age of twelve, at the stage where things start to truly make sense and his purpose started to revolve around finding Taeyong. That seemed to be his goal in each lifetime. He would wake up and remember and then he would wait until it was proper time to start looking. Sometimes he meets Taeyong, sometimes he doesn't find him. 

In those lifetimes, Johnny's heart hurt the most.

* * *

_“I remember most fondly those lifetimes_ _where we get to grow up together,_ _when you share your secrets and sorrows_ _and hiding places with me.”_

Taeyong's name was Taeyong when they met as children. They were the same age again, just a few months apart and they were neighbors, children of the neighborhood that played together at the park. Johnny didn't remember Taeyong until his twelfth birthday and he was happy to have already found his soulmate without having to search the world for him. 

They were best friends, from when they were mere three year olds, growing up into young men that somehow always had each other's backs. Growing apart was inevitable, even while Johnny pined after Taeyong, because Taeyong had to move into another city and they couldn't meet as often. Still, Johnny waited patiently.

He specifically remembers a Christmas in 1885. Taeyong hadn't been able to visit so Johnny decided to travel and spend Christmas with Taeyong's family, who had always welcomed him as their own. Spending Christmas with Taeyong had always been something Johnny treasured.

"I need your help with something, Johnny," Taeyong had said the night before Christmas, the two of them laying in bed and huddled together for warmth. Taeyong sounded serious.

Johnny turned his head to look at the other, mesmerized yet again by the beauty that Taeyong exuded, even in the dim light. "Anything."

The smaller male then shifted his entire body to face Johnny, a gentle smile on his face. "I need you to go away with me."

"Go away? Go where?"

"Anywhere," Taeyong said, his voice hushed. "Anywhere but here. I want to leave. I have thought of it for so long. It's always stopped me because-" 

He paused, his eyes twinkling, large as he stared into Johnny's and continued to speak. "Because I didn't want to go away without you."

Sometimes, Johnny thinks Taeyong remembers too, especially whenever he talked of being with Johnny or how incomplete it would be without him, like he knew there had been lifetimes that they didn't meet, lifetimes where one of them didn't exist. Lifetimes where it hurt the most.

"I'd go anywhere with you, Taeyong," Johnny had said, his body turned as well and his larger hand closed around Taeyong's smaller one.

Taeyong smiled at him, kissed his knuckles. "Then let's go, Johnny. Now is the only time."

They left before the sun rose. Taeyong had a bag of his clothes ready, as if he had been waiting for the right moment to ask Johnny, who didn't have clothes to go with, just some coins to survive on. It didn't scare him; he had lived several lifetimes to know how to make it through this one. 

Taeyong's name was Taeyong the first time Johnny felt truly, genuinely, wholeheartedly loved. When he was Ruby, there had always been a sense of indebtedness that was mixed up with his adoration and love for Johnny. When he was Oli, Johnny had come a little too late.

When he was Taeyong, he grew with Johnny, hand in hand, through mistakes and achievements and proud decisions as well as bad ones. When Taeyong was Taeyong, Johnny was unexplainably, overwhelmingly happy.

That is why he remembers Taeyong the most.

* * *

_“Yet, always, you forgive me._ _As if you understand what’s going on,_ _and you’re making up for all the lifetimes_ _in which one of us doesn’t exist.”_

Losing Taeyong in that lifetime was, to put simply, heartbreaking. Johnny doesn't like remembering it and tries, to this day, to tamper it down with fresher memories. Their deaths could be sudden, mysterious or as naturally human as possible. Taeyong when he was first Taeyong, left Johnny in his sleep, at merely fifty and gone too soon. The heartbreak made Johnny sick.

In the few lives after that, Johnny was even more desperate to find Taeyong, to wash away the memory of losing him too suddenly, too quickly. He didn't find him until he was reaching a man of forty years and Taeyong, some years younger.

Taeyong's name was Kiernan, an aspiring writer with a few published titles in the market, a divorcee and a father of two. As terrible as it may sound, Johnny was happy Taeyong was divorced.

He found Taeyong through his book and had flown miles to meet him in person, at a library where he was said to speak of his book. Setting his eyes on Taeyong for the first time in that lifetime felt truly relieving and Johnny knows then that he would be okay, even if Taeyong couldn't love him back like he didn't as Oli.

Except he did. Taeyong was good, as a person, as a writer and as a father. He was only allowed to see his two girls over the weekends and after a while, when they've grown closer as friends, Taeyong would invite Johnny along to meet his daughters. They each had a mole on the bottom side of their lower lips, just like Taeyong's.

Kiernan, as Taeyong was known then, was particular about things. In every life that Johnny meets Taeyong, Taeyong differed in personality. What he was as Ruby, he wasn't as Kiernan, and Johnny found himself making mistakes.

Still, Taeyong was kind and he forgave him easily. He made time for Johnny, even in his busy schedule and was attached to him as if he too, had missed Johnny. As if he knew that their together in the previous life was cut too short. 

As if he knew that it took several lifetimes for Johnny to finally find him again, that in the ones in between, Taeyong simply didn't exist. 

* * *

_“and the ones where we just, barely, never meet.”_

It is rare, but sometimes Johnny would be a little too late. He was twenty, chasing after an education not many were privileged enough to have and he saw Taeyong in the papers, twenty-one and a victim of drunk driving.

He blamed himself when those happened. In his wake, he wondered the many what-ifs; what if he had come sooner? What if he hadn't left his suitcase in his house? What if he had stepped out a second earlier? What if he would have met Taeyong if he had done all those what-ifs?

Johnny hates those lives the most. 

* * *

_“I hate those. I prefer the ones in which you kill me.”_

There are many ways to die and Johnny had died countless times. He had died of natural causes, he had died in war, he had died tragically, caught within a burning building, too late to escape. He had died by his own hand. He had died due to the unbearable pain of losing Taeyong.

The one time he had died in the hands of someone else, however, was his favorite. 

He would not choose it on purpose, no. Still, of all the deaths he had gone through, the most painful had been when Taeyong stuck a knife right through his heart, fear in his eyes, a tremble in his hands. He would never be unkind, there would never be a bad bone in Taeyong's body.

Johnny finds it rather sickening, how even in such an act of betrayal, dying by the hands of the one person he trusted most, he still found Taeyong nothing less than beautiful.

There isn't any resentment for what Taeyong had done; Johnny understood even then that it was a choice Taeyong had to make. He understood that there hadn't been pure, unfiltered love in Taeyong's heart for him, and that was the only reason why Taeyong chose himself.

Johnny would always want Taeyong to choose himself. 

In truth, really, Johnny would prefer having Taeyong stab him a million times than to exist in a world without him in it. 

* * *

_“Even though each time_ _I_ _know I’ll see you again,_ _I always wonder;_ _Is this the last time?_ _Is that really you?”_

It feels like a never ending cycle to Johnny. In his life now, when he started remembering, Johnny wondered if it would ever end. He wondered if his soul was cursed, for it to come back again and again and again in search of the other soul that was made to be his. He wondered if the reason Taeyong isn't in peace was because of him. 

His wandering thoughts, however, could never outweigh his natural need to find Taeyong. 

The world has evolved by now. It moves too fast, Johnny thinks. Everything is no longer the way it was in his first life, nothing is the way it was in his previous life. Taeyong, though, Taeyong is the only constant in this ever-changing world.

This time when they met again, it was in a dance studio and Johnny was a trainee, training to be an idol. He had chosen this path when he was little and when he had remembered everything, Johnny thought it would be kind to his childhood self to make this dream come true. 

Perhaps, though it was unlikely, once he is known and his name is recognizable, Taeyong would find him instead. It was a dream he made into motivation, a drive to work hard, to be good.

Taeyong's name is Taeyong when they meet in that studio, a new trainee joining the company. Johnny found his gaze and offered him a smile. For once, he didn't have to look far.

* * *

_“And what if you’re perfectly happy_ _without me?”_

This lifetime came with its own heartbreak. Johnny did what he did best, approaching Taeyong and befriending him first before anything else. He had never forced Taeyong into loving him, though sometimes he thinks he grew desperate and made sure Taeyong would only see him. Not this time, though. Not this life.

The world is new and love can never be forced. Taeyong fell in love with someone else with Johnny to witness and he couldn't do anything to stop it. While it hurts, Johnny had lived too many times to be selfish. Perhaps, he'd thought, it was someone else's time to be so wonderfully loved.

They're put into a group to debut together and Johnny and Taeyong had been best friends for years. Taeyong fell in love with Jaehyun in the middle of it, just before Johnny could tell him about his feelings. Jealousy is wicked, he thinks. And he was young no matter how old his soul is.

Taeyong and Jaehyun debuted first before Johnny. More than the slight bitterness of having been training for far longer and not getting the opportunity to be presented to the world before them, Johnny was envious that Jaehyun had all the chance to spend time with Taeyong.

Eventually, however, Johnny grew out of his childish feelings and accepted the fact that Taeyong in this life is not the Taeyong that had loved him in the past, even though they had the same name, the same face, the same kind heart.

* * *

_“Ah, but I don’t blame you;_ _I’ll never burn as brilliantly as you.”_

Johnny stares at Taeyong now, seated on his desk with the familiar music from the game Taeyong liked to play so much filling the room. He's laying on Taeyong's bed, at three in the morning, exhausted from a day of back to back schedule. He should have probably just returned to the room he shares with Donghyuck but Johnny had missed Taeyong especially terribly tonight.

Johnny thinks he's doing well in this life. He thinks it might be the best one yet. Not only had he found Taeyong early, effortlessly, he's also surrounded by people who are endlessly so supportive of him. His parents are amazing and they took care of him so well, even now, a full grown man capable of caring for himself.

The friends he made in this industry are just as great, especially these ones he calls his brothers. He's not sad or alone and he's confident and determined and really, really content. He's funny too, he thinks. The world is easier, and it softens his heart and soul and makes him this version of himself that he prefers among the rest.

He thinks he has Taeyong to thank still, even though Taeyong isn't his. Sometimes during interviews he would refer to Taeyong as his soulmate and Taeyong would call him his. It's in those little things that make Johnny so happy.

His heart feels heavy somehow tonight. Taeyong and Jaehyun had mutually agreed to end their relationship some years ago and Johnny knows he has a chance, knows that if they're truly meant to be then they would be eventually. But he's weighed down by the fact that he had grown close to Jaehyun, inevitably since they live together, work together and are in a group of brothers Johnny treasures with his entire being.

It sits uneasy for him to be pursuing his friend's ex lover, no matter how much he aches for Taeyong to love him back, to be his again.

"What are you thinking about, Johnny?" Taeyong asks and Johnny blinks, not realizing that he had been staring up at the ceiling while his mind raced. Taeyong gets off his chair and easily comes over to slip into his bed next to the taller.

Johnny smiles, happy to have Taeyong this close. They're comfortable enough to squeeze into a bed too small for two and he turns his body so he faces the other, smiling like they were the first time Taeyong's name was Taeyong. "Too many things in my head to be telling you what exactly."

Taeyong smiles then, eyes dipped down to Johnny's chest. His lips part but he doesn't say anything for a little while so Johnny waits. "There's so many things I want to say too, Johnny."

"I have time," Johnny says, light in his voice. 

The smile on Taeyong's face is almost blinding. Johnny's heart aches even more. He wishes he could kiss Taeyong. The boy hums then, shifting so he's on his back, face up towards the ceiling. "I still like red roses."

Johnny frowns, trying to make sense of what Taeyong had said. Taeyong had loved the flower in every one of his lives, Johnny knows that. He knows Taeyong loves it now too, so what had Taeyong meant when he said he still does?

When Johnny doesn't respond immediately, Taeyong turns his head to look at him. "I didn't realize my feelings for you until you went off to war, in 1623. I cried for you for years, Johnny."

 _What?_ "Taeyong, what-"

"Listen. Let me speak," Taeyong hushes him, getting up to sit and Johnny follows. "When you freed me from that brothel, I didn't come back because I was indebted to you. I came back because I loved you. I've loved you even before you told me you were going to free me."

Johnny's heart is beating loud and fast against this chest. It feels like a dream and he wonders if this is the in between he has always wondered about, the space between dying and being born again, where Taeyong actually remembers.

"When I asked you to go away with me, I was so afraid you wouldn't," Taeyong continues, his eyes now shiny with tears. "I was so afraid I'd have to stay with my family and marry someone they wanted me to marry. I didn't want that. I wanted to be with you."

It's hard to stop Taeyong from continuing now that he'd started. Taeyong does this when he's nervous or upset, spitting word after word with no room to breathe and Johnny could only listen.

One of Taeyong's hand lifts to wipe at his cheek, where there is already a single trail of a tear. "I didn't mean to betray you. I didn't want you to go but it was the only way, Johnny. It was the only way. They wouldn't let you go if I didn't. I had to. I'm so sorry, I had to."

Taeyong's teary outbreak makes Johnny's heart hurt and naturally, instinctively, he pulls Taeyong into his arms and holds him close, tight against his chest. Taeyong continues to sob into his shirt, his small body shaking and Johnny tightens his hold, tells him it's okay even though his own mind races, confused, surprised. 

After a while, when Taeyong stops shaking and his eyes are swollen and cheeks pink, he stays within Johnny's arms and lets his own wind around the taller's midriff. 

"When did you start remembering?" Johnny asks then, his curiosity getting the best of him.

Taeyong hums, "The few months before Jaehyun and I broke up. Do you remember the night I came to you crying? You didn't push me to tell you why, you just held me as I cried."

"Why didn't you tell me then? I could've been there for you."

"But you were," Taeyong pulls back then, gaze meeting Johnny's. He sniffles, "You were. You were always there. In every memory that came to me, you were a part of it. You're always there."

Johnny realizes then that Taeyong merely remembers lives where they do meet, not the almost's and certainly not the ones where Johnny spent years and years looking, because he simply didn't exist then. 

"I wanted to process it all," Taeyong explains, wiping at his nose and sighing after. "It was a lot to take in, to remember. But eventually I have it under control. Sometimes a random memory comes when something triggers it. Like when you came into the room without even knocking, because you brought me food and didn't want to wake me in case I was sleeping. I remember you doing the same a long time ago."

"Do you remember names?" Johnny asks. 

Taeyong nods his head, "I was Ilwoon and I was sick," he laughs a little, shaking his head. "It was winter and I was really craving noodles. You went out anyway and bought me a bowl, because we didn't have enough for two."

Johnny remembers that life in particular. He smiles at the memory because it was a good life, even though they were poor and they didn't get to spend much time together because of it.

"We did have enough for two," Johnny says, leaning back against the wall and gazing fondly at Taeyong. "But it wouldn't be enough to get you that sugar cane drink you were craving."

The smaller male's lips quivered though he tries to smile through it. He reaches out to take Johnny's hand and kisses his knuckles the way he always did before, in the lives before this one. 

He stares at Johnny's hand, fingers toying with the taller's longer ones and then he intertwines them with his own, smiling as he tightens his grip. "Do you think it means something now that I can remember?"

"I don't know," Johnny says sincerely, looking at their clasped hands as well. "I don't think it matters. I just— The only thing that's ever mattered to me was finding you, after I found out the first time I came back that it was possible for us to meet again. After that it was the only thing I wanted. For us to meet again."

Taeyong is quiet, watching Johnny's face and looking small and fragile despite the fact that he is the strongest person Johnny knows. "I don't know if I could… I love you, Johnny. I know I do and I think you know that too. I'd have loved you even without my memories."

"It's just," he continues. "It's a lot. I'm filled with so much guilt, for every decision I've ever made, every time those decisions hurt you. I've spent the last two years trying to accept that it's already happened but it also came with the knowledge that I don't deserve it. I don't deserve your love."

He listens because he understands but there is also a strong urge in his chest to tell Taeyong that if anyone deserves the world, it would be him. Instead, Johnny merely smiles at his soulmate, guiding him back upon the mattress and they lay there and stare up at Taeyong's ceiling.

"I know, Taeyong. I understand," Johnny breaks the silence finally. He takes Taeyong's hand again and squeezes it gently. "I'll wait for you. I've waited for you my entire life, multiple times. I'll always wait for you."

Taeyong sniffles again and Johnny turns his head to see more tears fall down his temple. He reaches over and wipes it off with the pad of his thumb. Taeyong's eyes close and Johnny feels his eyes burn as well. So close yet so far and he wouldn't deny how much his heart hurts. 

He turns his body and pulls Taeyong closer. The latter allows him to, even snuggles in close to his chest and Johnny rests his chin on the top of Taeyong's head. It's okay, he thinks. He had survived life after life where Taeyong hadn't loved him back. This would just be another one.

"Thank you, Johnny," Taeyong says an hour after, both of them unable to sleep.

Johnny doesn't say anything and instead he cradles Taeyong close until they both fall asleep. It's much too late to let his thoughts wander and it hurts too much to let it go so easily. 

* * *

_"It’s only fair that I should be the one_ _t_ _o chase you across ten, twenty-five,_ _a hundred lifetimes_ _until I find the one_ _where you’ll return to me.”_

It's clear and acknowledged that winning in music shows doesn't determine a group's talent. They talk about this amongst themselves and Johnny had even seen it being discussed amongst their fans, who had endlessly supported them since day one. 

Yet, as they stood on stage awaiting the results, Johnny could almost feel the tension and nervousness radiating off all of his group members. Taeyong, especially, being the leader and holding a heavy responsibility to remind the boys that there is always another time should they lose this one whilst carrying the burden of knowing they could have done better. 

Then, when it's announced that they are the winner for the week's show, Johnny thinks all the pain and hard work they've put into bringing this album to life is worth it. It's all worth it.

They stay humble but there's a difference to the energy they radiate in the pictures they took with the award in hand compared to the ones where they go back to the dorm empty handed.

He doesn't get time alone with Taeyong until the rest are changing into clothes to go back home, their chit chats loud and happy and it makes Johnny's insides warm and soft because he's happy to know his brothers are as well. 

When he goes to see Taeyong, the leader of the group, Johnny's best friend and soulmate, Taeyong's first reaction is to run up to him and jump right into his arms. Johnny laughs as he tries to balance himself, holding the male close, so close and maybe a little too long. 

Doyoung sees it but he doesn't question it and instead tells them in passing to be quick because they'd have to head back to the dorm really soon. 

When Johnny places Taeyong back onto his feet, they're both smiling, praises for each other standing at the tips of their tongues. Taeyong did well and so did Johnny and he wants to say it so badly but Taeyong beats him to it.

"Johnny," he says, his big eyes sparkling, lips smiling. Johnny falls in love again. "I'm- I just want to tell you that we did really well. I mean, there's something else I want to tell you but I'm not sure if we should wait until we're back at the dorm."

Johnny frowns. "Why? What is it? Did something bad happen?"

Taeyong laughs, shaking his head. "I just don't want us to get caught."

Old soul that he is, Johnny admits he is pretty dumb and slow sometimes, especially when it comes to Taeyong. "And what would we be doing that we don't want them to catch us?"

"This," Taeyong whispers, all playful and soft and small and everything that Taeyong is before he leans up and presses a kiss onto the corner of Johnny's mouth, pulling back with a giggle.

They laugh immediately after that because it's corny and cringey and Taeyong is adorable but it was never in his nature to be pulling something like that. Not when they're off camera and he's not expected to perform the ever embarrassing aegyo they always make these idols do. 

It was a show of something, Johnny knows that and he knows that it's something _good_. "Is that you telling me that you've decided to ignore every bad feeling you have and admit that we're meant to find each other?"

Taeyong laughs again, rolling his eyes and scrunching up his nose before he speaks. "Close," he says. "I'm not going to ignore the feelings. I'm simply choosing to be with you."

"What changed your mind?"

"You," Taeyong smiles at him and it's kind and beautiful and just like the first time Taeyong had ever smiled at Johnny, years and years ago.

Johnny quirks a brow up at Taeyong. "Am I or am I not allowed to hear more to that?"

"Just," Taeyong shrugs. "You're just unafraid. And you're patient and you love me. And I don't just love you because you love me, or because my soul was made to be with yours. I just think, if you love me and I love you and there's nothing in between us, then why aren't we together?"

"Took you long enough to realize that," Johnny teases and it earns himself a pinch to the side, to which he laughs at as he tries to dodge. "I'm kidding. I'm happy to know that, Yongie."

Taeyong beams, gesturing for Johnny to turn around so he does and he waits. It's become their thing that Taeyong gets onto his back whenever he gets tired and Johnny would carry him anywhere. Even within the year that Johnny lets Taeyong slowly adjust to the memories, after that night, their friendship continued to flourish.

Hopping onto his back now, Taeyong holds onto Johnny tightly and as Johnny moves to join the rest of the group, Taeyong risks a kiss onto the shell of the taller's ear. "Isn't it nice that nothing's changed even when we did?"

"It is," Johnny agrees, knowing what Taeyong meant. "It feels like we never died in between."

Taeyong laughs. Johnny could hear the smile in his voice when he speaks again. "I like that. I like that I can be like this with you and still be best friends. I'm just happy. You make me happy."

"You make me happy too, baby." Johnny says as he walks towards where the rest of their friends are already gathered. It isn't a rare sight for them to see Taeyong on Johnny's back so they ignored it and Donghyuck merely calls out for Johnny to try the food their seniors had bought for them. 

"I think we're lucky too," Taeyong adds as he hops off Johnny's back, smiling a little wider. "Look at the family we get to have this time. We'd always be happy with them."

Johnny nods to agree. His heart feels warm and everything in the world feels right. Turning to face Taeyong, Johnny risks a kiss too, but he leaves it on Taeyong's cheek. If anyone sees it, they don't show it. 

"I'm luckiest, though." He says, his own smile remained and without caring for what the rest may think, Johnny kisses Taeyong, soft and gentle and fulfilling. Taeyong blushes when he pulls back and they share cheek hurting smiles before Johnny pulls Taeyong into his arms again.

Taeyong's name is Taeyong again when he finally returns to Johnny. He is kind and good and he is soft and gentle. His smile is blinding, his eyes are bright, his touch is warm. His soul burns hotter than the sun and he loves Johnny. 

He has always loved Johnny.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!! comments and kudos are appreciated!!


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